Soapsuds Hollow: Dells family shares ties with former French president

By Tim Schwebach

January 28. 2014 1:05PM

Reaching back into your family history can provide some very interesting relationships. You may not know it, but you might be related to someone of importance in world history.

Writing this column is fun. People seem to enjoy reading it, and the feedback is enjoyable for me. Ideas are always welcome, and Dee Salviola was kind enough to loan a couple of scrapbooks to me, which I have been reading with great interest.

Dee was a Geraets, so there is quite a bit of Geraets history in those scrapbooks. Clippings of weddings and funerals provide links to other families. One might assume that we are all related after reading through these books.

My grandfather was one of 15 children. Rose Geraets was a Schwebach. Ken Lebrun was married to Rosemary Bricher, and her mother was a Schwebach. It goes on and on.
Ken LeBrun's grandfather was Louis LeBrun, and he was married to a Geraets. Louis lived two miles east of Dell Rapids.

One of the articles in Dee's scrapbook tells about Louis and his first cousin, Albert. Louis didn't like a lot of publicity, and it seems he was just a hard-working farmer who pretty much kept to his own. He shunned publicity, but the press snuck a photo of him back in the 1930s for that article.

Why would the press be interested in Louis and his cousin? Because his cousin, Albert, was the President of France from 1932 to 1940.

So, if Louis was a first cousin to the President of France, and if Kenny's wife's mother was a Schwebach, I wonder how that makes me related to Albert, the former President of France.

I'm afraid it's not enough to warrant a celebration for me, but it's pretty cool for my LeBrun cousins!